What would Greatest Generation say?
I was appalled to read that a woman recently berated Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff in the parking lot of an H-E-B with threats of violence over Wolff ’s emergency orders around mask requirements.
Just a few days earlier, I received an intemperate email from one of our law students who compared the St. Mary’s University rule requiring unvaccinated students to be tested weekly to the Taliban’s gross mistreatment of women.
I couldn’t help but think about the sacrifices of the Greatest Generation. The Greatest Generation includes those men and women who were born between 1901 and 1927. They were shaped as children or young adults by the Great Depression of the 1930s, and they later served their country during World War II. As journalist Tom Brokaw wrote in his book about these phenomenal men and women, they lived, worked and battled not for fame and fortune, but because it was “the right thing to do” — what we might today call “the greater good.”
I thought of one of my mentors, John Cribbet, a member of the Greatest Generation and one of the finest individuals I have ever known. I met John in 1985 while I was a young assistant professor at the University of Illinois College of Law, and he had just returned to the law school after leading the university as its chancellor. John, also a former dean of the law college and legendary law professor, would always respond, whenever asked how he was doing, that he was “top drawer.” My mentor’s generosity of spirit and his gratitude at the blessings of life brightened the days of all of us who were fortunate to know him.
Given what I know about John’s life, not all his days could have been “top drawer.” John joined the war effort in 1942 on the European front when his wife was pregnant with their second child. He served as aide-de-camp to U.S. Army Gen. Troy
Middleton during the Battle of the Bulge, when the U.S. Army looked to be hopelessly surrounded by German forces.
Not until John returned from the war in 1946 did he meet his then-4-year-old daughter and reunite with his wife and other child. My mentor’s sacrifices were huge, but he would readily acknowledge that they were nothing compared to the thousands of soldiers who never returned to family and friends.
Unlike my mentor’s storied career, my parents’ lives were not Wikipedia notable. Nothing about their lives was historic. My high school-educated father served in the Naval Air Corps during the war, but he never saw combat. My mother and father raised five children, and she taught kindergarten and first grade. Together, my mother and father worked to see that their children received educations that would provide more opportunity than they had.
My parents’ lives were like so many of your parents’ lives. They reflected the values of their generation — humble men and women who placed faith in God, family and neighbors before themselves.
And here is a story that is the most telling about Mom and Dad: When I was a toddler, my father was honored by his company as its national salesman of the year. For his efforts, the company rewarded my parents with an all-expenses-paid trip “around the world.” Like their many friends from the neighborhood, they did the right thing. They sold it — to better afford the care and education of their children.
I am certain that my parents, their friends and my mentor John Cribbet would shake their heads in disbelief at the frenzy over the minor inconveniences of wearing masks indoors and getting tested periodically. Thankfully, so, too, do the thousands of excellent men and women of San Antonio who place the greater good of our community before themselves.